OC FAIR

On a hot afternoon this week at the OC Fair, a backhoe shoved dirt against a row of busted-up cars, creating a ramp for the monster trucks that would fly over them in a few hours. Dan Gaines, who was leading a tour of the area, noted that some fairgoers were willing to pay a few extra dollars to reserve a seat in the Action Sports Arena, where the truck show would be held in a few hours.

That tidbit of information from Gaines, who is director of entertainment for the fair, would be inconsequential to most people on a tour. But it was precisely what Gaines' charges wanted to hear.

His tour group Wednesday included roughly 40 executives and directors from state and local fairs in the Western U.S., all interested in details about how the OC Fair operates with the aim of bringing new ideas back to their own events.

The visit was arranged by the Western Fairs Association, a trade group that chooses one fair each year to tour. This year it was the OC Fair's turn to host the directors and CEOs from fairs in California, Arizona, Oregon, Washington and elsewhere.

The executives were looking for details like how traffic is managed, where performers unpack their props, seating arrangements for shows in the Hangar, and the extra charges for those arena seats

Musicians and performers for The Hangar come through a back gate and have 20 minutes to unload in a staging area, and another 20 minutes to pack up when they're finished, Gaines told his tour group. Until 2010, the fair didn't charge for seats in The Hangar or the Action Sports Arena, but now it does. For a few extra dollars over the regular price of admission, fairgoers can reserve a seat. The seats used to go to the people who got there first, but long lines resulted.

“What we learned over time is that many people would not like to fight the crowds,” Gaines said, explaining the decision to charge extra for the Arena and Hangar shows. “It guarantees them a seat when they get here.”

“If they're waiting two hours in a line, they're not going on a ride, they're not buying a beer and they're not buying a corn dog.”

Fairs need to be “more entrepreneurial” while also sticking to their agricultural and traditional roots, said Sandy Woods, CEO of the Nevada County fair, about 60 miles northeast of Sacramento. Woods' fair brings in about 95,000 people and has a budget of about $2.2 million, about a tenth of that of the OC Fair. Recent cuts in state funding for fairs forced her fair to rethink its budget.

“We're not operating on this scale,” she said. “We kind of drool when we come to this fair. … We get our best ideas from other fairs. We like to borrow from other fairs, or steal.”

Kent Hojem, CEO of the Washington state fair, marveled at the wide variety of crops – herbs, peppers, lima beans, strawberries and avocados among them – growing in the Centennial Farm.

“We can't do this variety,” Hojem said, with regret. His fairgrounds has a smaller farm area, and his state has a shorter growing season, he said.

“The education aspect of this is absolutely awesome,” Woods said. “This is providing a superb opportunity for young people to learn about agriculture and where their food comes from.”

The state fair Hojem runs is more in line, sizewise, with the OC Fair. It brings in about 1.2 million people and has a budget of $25 million, compared with a budget of about $29 million for the OC Fair.

Unlike in Washington state, Orange County gets almost guaranteed sunshine, and that helps attendance. But so do other things the OC Fair is doing, he said. One of the programs the executives heard about was the We Care Wednesdays, where fairgoers can get free entry for bringing certain donated items. It appeared to be a success: on the Wednesday of the tour, the fairgrounds were flooded with crowds and traffic on the highway was slow for several miles leading to the site.

Hojem's fair does have a canned food drive on opening day, but multiple food drives over the course of the fair seemed to be an idea he could bring back home, he said. So did the $2 Taste of Fair Food promotion that food vendors offer on Fridays. He'd already called his fair food director back home about that idea and how the Washington State Fair could do it next year, he said.

The showiness – big, bright signs and giant grills – of the food vendors at the OC Fair was also something he wanted to bring to his fair.

“If I was getting a crowd like this on a Wednesday, I'd be ecstatic,” Hojem said as he walked through the fair. “I think this is the way we're going to go. … The key is to remain relevant and continue to evolve.”

Just like the OC Fair has to compete with Disneyland and shopping malls, the Washington State Fair has to compete with malls and casinos for people's discretionary dollars, he said. Attendance at the Washington State Fair has been flat for the last 12 or so years, he said.

Weather, the economy and a number of factors keep attendance from growing steadily at most fairs, said Stephen Chambers, executive director of the Western Fairs Association. But in his 30-plus years in the industry, no fair has grown as much as the OC Fair has, he said.

“Wednesday is not a strong day at most fairs,” Chambers said. “(The OC Fair) has turned what for most fairs is a mediocre day and turned it into a freaking awesome day.”

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